Spoken words can be much more effective when accompanied with animation, so my clients have been asking me to put together short animations for them. Here’s my workflow in case you’re interested in doing this too.

Step 1: Draw the images and get them approved.

Make your canvas roughly the same size as your final image so that you can save frames if needed. The bottom layer should be your background colour (ex: white). You can use a grid to line things up, then hide the grid when you’re ready to export. Use one layer per scene in your animation.

Draw the image – get it approved if necessary

Step 2: Prepare for animation.

Hide everything but the first scene and your background layer. Add a white layer at 90% opacity above your sketch. This allows you to trace over your sketch while making it easy to remove the pre-sketch in Camtasia Studio. Using a translucent white layer allows you to fade your other scenes without adjusting the opacity for each of them.

Prepare for animation

Step 3: Lay out your screen.

Zoom in as close to 100% as possible. Use TAB to hide the Autodesk Sketchbook interface and position your sketch so that the important parts are not obscured by the little lagoon controller on the left side. You can turn the title bar off, too. Set Camtasia Recorder to record your screen without that little controller – you can either record only part of your screen, or add a white callout afterwards.

Lay out your screen

If you need to create HD video, a high-resolution monitor will give you the space you need. My Cintiq 12WX has a resolution of 1280×800, and my laptop has a resolution of 1366×768. When I need to record at 1920×1080, I use my Cintiq as a graphics tablet for an external monitor instead.

It’s probably a good idea to turn audio off so that you don’t have to split it out and remove it later.

Cintiq buttons

This is also a good time to set up convenient keyboard shortcuts or buttons. The Cintiq 12WX has some programmable buttons, so here’s how I set mine up:

Left button: Ctrl-z – handy for quickly undoing things instead of flipping over to the eraser.

Middle right button: TAB – hides and shows the interface.

Bottom button: Ctrl-Shift-F8 – the keyboard shortcut I set up my Camtasia Studio with, so I can pause and resume recording.

This makes it easier for me to pause (bottom), show the interface (middle right), change colours or brushes, hide the interface (middle right), and resume (bottom). That reduces the editing I need to do afterwards.

Step 4: Record!

Because the pre-sketch shows you where things should go and you’ve already fiddled with the layout to make sure things fit, it’s easy to draw quickly and confidently. Use TAB to hide or show the interface. When you’re starting out, you may find it easier to record in one go and then edit out the segments when you’re switching brushes or colours. As you become more comfortable with switching back and forth between full-screen drawing and using the Autodesk Sketchbook Pro interface, try the workflow that involves pausing the screen, showing the interface, hiding the interface, and then resuming the recording.

Step 5: Edit and synchronize in Camtasia Studio.

Save and edit the video. Set it to the recording dimensions of your final output, and set the background colour to white.

Now synchronize the video with the audio. You may want to add markers to your audio so that you can easily tell where the significant points are. Use the timeline to find out the duration between markers. Split your video at the appropriate points by selecting the video and typing s. Use clip speed (right-click on the segment) to adjust the speed until the video duration matches what you need.

Note that at high clip speeds, Camtasia drops a lot of frames. If this bothers you, you can render the sketch at 400% speed using Camtasia or Movie Maker, produce that as an AVI or MP4, re-import that media, and continue compressing it at a maximum of 400% speed each time until you get the speed you want.

If you need to cover up a mistake, a simple white rectangular callout can hide that effectively. If you need to make something longer, extend the frame. Because you can’t extend frames into video that’s already there, you may want to drag the segment onto a different track, and then split or cut the excess.

Hope this workflow helps you get into doing more animated sketches with Autodesk Sketchbook Pro and Camtasia Studio on a laptop or desktop computer. Do you use other tools or other workflows? Please share!

Caroline Chapple was curious about how people prepare for sketchnoting events. I focus on digital sketchnoting, and here’s the workflow that allows me to cover a conference while publishing sketchnotes within 5-10 minutes after the end of each talk.

Before the event

I confirm the agreement, invoice, copyright, and publishing arrangements. Sometimes I take care of publishing right away, which gives clients the full benefit of working digitally. If the client wants to integrate the images into their branded website, I can also e-mail the high-resolution images to a specified person. I can also CC a specified person when publishing links on Twitter to make it easy for them to retweet the talks. My standard agreement retains copyright, grants clients various rights, and places the work under Creative Commons Attribution license for wider distribution.

I confirm the order of the talks and the spelling of speaker names and talk titles. It’s better to get this in written form before the day of the event, as sometimes getting it on the day of the event itself can introduce errors. If speakers are hard to find or confirm on Twitter, I ask about Twitter usernames as well.

I confirm event URL and hashtag. Sketchnotes tend to get shared widely, so I like including a short URL where people can find more information. To facilitate conversation during the event itself, I can also include a Twitter hashtag.

I collect event and sponsor logos, official speaker photos, and more. One of the advantages of digital sketchnoting is the ease of adding other images. See http://experivis.com/collection/tedxocadu-2013/ for an example of sketchnotes that used event-specific speaker photos for a consistent feel.

Collect speaker presentations if possible. This gives me a sense of the presentation flow and key points. It also lets me start thinking about how to

Get other background information. My consulting work means I’m familiar with large corporations, technology, and the financial industry. Other interests give me familiarity with entrepreneurship, personal finance, personal development, and so on. I speed-read, so getting through a stack of background information is no problem.

Prepare the sketchnote template

For events with multiple talks, I create a Dropbox folder in order to make sharing easier. If the event has a single talk, I save it in my sketchnotes folder in Dropbox. Here’s how I set up my Autodesk Sketchbook Pro template from the bottom up:

Talk titles and speaker names, pictures, and Twitter usernames: If there are multiple talks, I use layers instead of separate files to make it easier to switch during the event itself or make any modifications I need to the base layers.

Other setup

Palette colours: If the event or organizer has specific colours, I use those in order to visually brand the images. If not, I use black with yellow highlights and possibly red or blue accents.

Filenames: I use Save As to set up all the filenames beforehand so that I can overwrite them during the event instead of retyping them. This is handy when in tablet mode when I don’t have access to my keyboard. My naming convention is YYYYMMDD – Event – # – Title – Speaker.png.

Tweets and ClipMate: If I’m in charge of publishing, I prepare the tweets beforehand so that I can tweak them to fit within the character limit. The tweets should include the title, Twitter username of speaker (or name if they’re not on Twitter), collection URL, hashtag, and any CCs I need to include.

Clear disk space for recording: As a backup and a potential bonus, I record my screen and the audio. This allows me to fill in the gaps in case something goes wrong, and I can also create speed-drawing videos if things work out. The audio quality isn’t very good, but it’s enough to fill in the gaps or allow me to synchronize in case the organizer publishes an official recording.

Shared folder: If a conference includes multiple talks, it’s easier for me to share a Dropbox folder with the organizer than e-mail them all the files and worry about e-mail bounces. In that case, I’ll confirm that they can accept the invite and access the files. (Some company intranets block access to Dropbox.)

Visual vocabulary: I dig into my Evernote-based visual library and look at how other people have drawn abstract concepts I’ll probably run into. I also use Google Image Search to look for ideas. I flip through my past sketchnotes to get a sense of what I liked and what I want to improve, too.

Gear

I carry a lot of gear. In addition to a fully-charged Lenovo X220 tablet PC, I also carry:

an external battery that lets me cover an entire conference day

a charger

a backup stylus in case I drop mine

a cellphone with unlimited Internet to allow me to tether, if the event doesn’t have usable WiFi

a backup battery for the cellphone

a tablet in case my computer suffers catastrophic failure

a notebook and a technical pen in case my computer suffers catastrophic failure and the tablet isn’t as convenient to use

business cards or print-outs of sketchnotes, because people always ask me for contact information

water bottle, energy bars, nuts, dried fruit: Some fast-paced conferences barely have time for bathroom breaks, especially if you’re trying to cover as much as possible. My concentration wavers if I get hungry, so I keep snacks and water handy.

I usually manage to cram all of these into a backpack, although I switch to a rolling suitcase if needed. I usually bike to events, although sometimes I’ll take transit or hitch a ride if the weather is bad or the event is far (or there are lots of hills and other biking annoyances).

When I get to the event

I check in with the organizer and find my seat. Because I work digitally, I don’t need easel space or a wall, and I can sit anywhere in the audience. I prefer to sit near the front: more leg room, it’s easier to see speakers’ faces, and you can often get speakers to autograph the sketches. For conferences with short breaks and multiple rooms, I may sit near the back to make it easier to go to the next room. For long events, I look for a spot near a power outlet (sometimes the organizer can arrange this), or I use my extended battery and then recharge it in the staff room during breaks.

I get the WiFi information if the event provides it. Uploading is much faster over WiFi compared to my phone, so I use that if it’s available. Most events that offer WiFi require some kind of login. If there’s no WiFi, I set up tethering on my phone.

I close other apps. This declutters the recording and reduces the chance of things going wrong.

I start the screen recording and any backup audio recording if needed. I use Camtasia Studio to record my screen, and I sometimes record backup audio on my phone or on a voice recorder.

If I’m worried about battery power, I turn off WiFi. I use my phone to monitor Twitter during breaks and slow parts, so I don’t need wireless access on my laptop for that.

Finally, I convert to tablet mode and switch to the appropriate layers in Autodesk Sketchbook Pro. If the speaker is around, I might start sketching them.

After each talk (~5-10 minutes)

I do any last-minute clean-ups. Working digitally means that I can quickly rearrange things if the talk included less information than I expected, or I can work with multiple layers if the talk included more information.

I hide the grid layer. Tada! It looks like I just happen to have really neat handwriting.

I save the main file. Good to have the layered PSD.

I use “Save a copy” to save a PNG, overwriting the file that had already been set up with the talk information.

I turn on WiFi and upload the image, if I’m publishing each talk as it comes out. For one talk, I’ll use Windows Live Writer to publish it directly to the company blog. For multiple talks, I’ll upload it using WinSCP to the NexGen Gallery I set up, refresh the gallery, and copy the talk information from the filename. If the organizer wanted per-talk e-mails, I e-mail the file to the organizer.

I tweet the link. I use my prepared tweets or write one quickly.

At the end of the event

I post the talk collection and tweet the URL if I’m in charge of publishing. This makes it easy for people to see everything.

I e-mail the organizer with the details on where to find the files. If they asked for e-mail instead of publishing, I attach the files. If there are a lot of files, I split it over several e-mails or upload the files to Dropbox and send them a note once the files are available. I thank them for the opportunity to be of service. =)

If there were a lot of talks, I might put together a PDF or PPT of the slides, following the agenda order. This is another handy bonus.

If I didn’t receive payment on the day itself, I schedule a reminder to follow up.

I schedule social media follow-ups. These are really useful too: “Missed last week’s ____? Check out these sketchnotes: _____ #hashtag”. The organizers usually monitor the hashtag for a while, so it also nudges them to spread the links to their networks.

Wrap-up

So that’s how I can publish sketchnotes a few minutes after the talk itself. Sketchnoting a full-day conference with lots of fast-paced talks can be a real scramble (see my sketchnotes from Lean Startup Day – 33 sessions with hardly any breaks!), but it’s exhilarating. A streamlined workflow makes it easier to focus on capturing and sharing ideas instead of fussing about with tools.

Working digitally means minimal post-processing, faster publishing, better branding and visual coherence with the other event materials… Digital sketchnoting isn’t as immediately impressive as large-scale drawing on a four-foot sheet of paper taped to the wall, but it’s great for getting things out there while the talk is on people’s minds.

I’m keeping my sketchnoting commitments minimal because I have another high-priority project that has an unpredictable schedule, so I’m not currently accepting new jobs. Instead, I’m focusing on creating my own content. Still, this was an awesome workflow, and I hope someone picks it up and improves on it. When I get back into sketchnoting, I’m sure I’ll find it fun and awesome. =) Hope this workflow helps!

“I could never draw on a computer – I like paper too much.” Lots of people shy away from drawing on a tablet or tablet PC because they feel limited by the technology. I like sketchnoting on my tablet PC – I feel like I can do so much more than I can do on paper! =) Here are some of the limitations I’ve come across and how I’ve worked around them.

It’s hard to see the big picture

When I draw on an 8.5×11 or a 9×12 sketchbook – or when people do graphic recording on 4’ rolls of paper – it’s easy to see the big picture. On a tablet PC, I usually work zoomed-in so that I can write and draw neatly, but this means that I don’t get a sense of how everything fits together.

This limitation depends on the tools that you use. I’ve tried using the “Views” feature in ArtRage 4 and the “Navigator” feature in Adobe Illustrator, but neither program was responsive and reliable enough for me to use for sketchnoting. Aside from a tiny thumbnail photo, Autodesk Sketchbook Pro doesn’t have that kind of overall preview (yet?). Instead, I work around this limitation by frequently zooming in and out. The pen-based controls make it easy to do so, although it means that screen recordings are a little “bouncy”.

Another way I work around this limitation is to use a grid and pre-set brush sizesto keep sizes consistent. This means that even if I’m zoomed in, I don’t have to worry about accidentally drawing one part much bigger than the other, and the whole image still hangs together.

Since I don’t have a sense of how the page is laid out when I’m zoomed in and working on details, I usually leave plenty of whitespace around each of the sketchnote’s elements. If I need to visually balance the page, I can use the lasso tool to move things around.

Tools take up valuable screen space

Because I don’t see the entire image all at once and the toolboxes reduce how much screen estate I have available, I need to constantly pan or zoom. I get around this by organizing the user interface components in a compact, consistent configuration.

Picking the right thing to compare it with helps a lot. If I compare it with the full screen size or an 8.5×11” sheet of paper, I feel like I’m missing out. If I compare it with a pocket-sized notebook, on the other hand… I get about as much space, but a ton more functionality. =)

Autodesk Sketchbook Pro has shortcuts for hiding toolboxes and you can customize a small menu for quick access, but I haven’t used them. When I’m drawing, I want to minimize how much I need to think about drawing, and I want my frequently-used tools to be one click away (not two, not three).

Battery life can be an issue

Although tablets can last almost a full day of drawing, powerful tablet PCs like the one I use can run out of juice pretty quickly. No power, no drawing!

If I’m going to sketchnote a 1-2 hour event, I can usually get by with my regular battery. I switch to low-power mode, turn off wireless, and dim the screen. If I want to upload the sketchnote right after the event, I turn wireless back on just before I’m ready to upload. This usually gets me through.

For longer events or for events where I want to make sure that I don’t run out of power, I bring an external battery. With the external battery, I can get through a day of sketchnoting without needing to look for a power supply. If I’m sketchnoting a conference, I try to scout out power outlets (either in the presentation room or in the staff lounge) so that I can recharge the battery over lunch, just in case.

Tablet PCs are heavy

The power and performance come at a price: my laptop/tablet PC is 1.76kg on its own, and 2.7kg total with the extended battery. Then there’s the charger, a backup sketchbook, a water bottle, some snacks… My bag gets pretty full and heavy!

If I can bike to the event, I usually load up my saddlebags and fasten things securely. If not, I’ll take a padded backpack with chest and waist straps. I might look like I’m going camping, but at least I’m ergonomically sorted out.

You can lose data if the computer crashes or if you make mistakes

… and believe me, this has happened before. I’ve had problems with Microsoft OneNote and Adobe Illustrator on my tablet PC, and with Autodesk Sketchbook Pro on my Android tablet. That’s why I’ve settled on using Autodesk Sketchbook Pro on a tablet PC, which seems to be a much more reliable

I’ve also made silly mistakes like accidentally moving instead of panning, which meant that some of my drawing went “off-screen” and was lost. To guard against this, I use Camtasia Studio to record my screen during important sketchnoting sessions. That way, I can export selected images from my recording, or I can use the audio to help me redo the sketch.

After the event, I back up, back up, and back up. I save sketchnotes to Dropbox, and I back up my computer weekly to an external drive. I also e-mail or publish sketchnotes as soon as I can, so then the event organizer has a copy.

It’s easier to forget about your sketches because you can’t flip through them as easily

One of the nice things about sketchbooks is being able to quickly flip through it and rediscover old sketches. You can lose track of digital sketchnotes on your computer and you don’t have those physical encounters to remind you of them. I get around this by saving my sketchnotes to Evernote (so that they turn up whenever I search my notebooks or Google). I also publish as many as possible on my blog, so that I come across them when reviewing my archive or when other people link to or comment on them.

How do you work around the limitations of the tools that you use? What other limitations are holding you back? Please share comments or links below!

Cheryl Lowry wrote about something many sketchnoters struggle with: running out of sketchnoting room during a talk. It got me thinking about the style I lean towards in my notes, and how I deal with too much or too little content.

My sketchnoting style is more information-dense and more linear/column-based than many other sketchnote styles I’ve seen. You can compare my recent sketchnotes with the ones on Sketchnote Army or the Flickr Sketchnotes pool to get a sense of how they’re different. I take information-dense sketchnotes because I want to remember and I don’t trust my memory. If I want to create a summary later on, I can do that from my sketchnotes, but it’s difficult to go the other way around. I’ve learned not to trust that events will have video, that I’ll have the patience to sit through a recording, or that slides will make sense after a quick flip-through. My notes are all I can rely on if I want to make sure that the time I spend listening to a talk doesn’t just evaporate into forgetfulness. =) So even if my hand cramps a little after sketchnoting a full-day conference with few breaks (hooray for quick finger exercises and stretches), it’s worth it because I come away with much more and I can remember a lot.

I paraphrase a lot because I want to make ideas more concise, particularly when it comes to Q&A sessions where people haven’t rehearsed what they want to say.

I’ve thought about writing less and drawing more, but I’m actually pretty happy with where I am. Summarization comes afterwards, when I know what’s important to me. Most presentations do very little sign-posting of what they’re going to cover and how important each part is, and even the ones that do can sometimes go on interesting tangens. When I’m sketchnoting a presentation, I don’t want to prematurely lock into the structure or metaphor I think the speaker has (even if they say they’re going to talk about 7 things, for example). That takes me out of the moment and makes me second-guess myself when the speaker says something interesting that doesn’t fit into the pattern I want to draw. A column-based layout may feel less creative, but it frees me up to listen.

I might go back and move things around a little during the gaps in the talk, but I generally don’t go back and reorganize everything. I want to publish things as quickly as possible. My target is to publish the sketchnotes within 10 minutes after the talk ends, and I usually do. It’s a great way to delight people over social media.

I write simple letters on a plain white background. My images and text tend to be separated by whitespace so that I can move things around as needed. I draw uncomplicated figures. I generally use one or two accent colours and maybe a lighter shade for highlighting or depth. Again, I’m optimizing for speed and attention. I’ve thought about going back and revising some of my sketchnotes to be more visually engaging, but then there’s so much new material that would be interesting to draw instead. Besides, I don’t want to give people the impression that that kind of detail or layout is what they’ll get from me when live sketchnoting. I really like being done with a sketchnote shortly after a talk. This also means I don’t have to worry too much about following up and I don’t have to juggle multiple ongoing projects. I do occasionally revise sketches and help people turn them into proper illustrations for reuse, but that would definitely be a paid gig. =)

I draw over a light dot grid, and that helps me fill a page at a more consistent rate. I know that if there’s an hour-long talk, I can draw letters at my normal size. If it’s a short non-interactive talk like an Ignite presentation or a TED talk, I might put several talks on one page, or I might increase the size and be a little looser with the layout. As I listen, I adjust my writing depending on the rate that people are speaking. If they speak slowly or they repeat themselves a lot, I’ll draw more images. If they speak quickly, I’ll try to capture as much as I can, and then go back and add highlights and some icons afterwards. Because I work digitally, I can remove the grid before publishing the image. (See How I set up Autodesk Sketchbook Pro for sketchnoting)

Working digitally makes it easy for me to compensate for different talk densities. If a speaker ended up saying less than I expected, I can rearrange the text and images around to look more balanced or I can crop the image at the appropriate point. If a speaker says more, it’s easy to add another layer and save a separate image. Autodesk Sketchbook Pro isn’t a vector program, so enlarging things doesn’t work particularly well, but I can move around or reduce parts of my image if I need to squeeze in some more information.

Other sketchnoters have great tips, too. Some people write down just the first few letters of a word or phrase, and then go back and fill the rest when there’s time. The Bikablo books encourage you to practise drawing key icons the same way each time, so that you can quickly sketch the first couple of strokes to remind you of what to draw. The Sketchnote Handbook talks about using your audio memory to hold on to thoughts as you draw. These tips work for me, too, and I’m getting the hang of using them. Hope they work for you too!

One of the interesting things about sketchnoting is that now I have a better sense of how much space there is in most presentations and conversations. It’s like seeing key words light up and thinking, “Oh, I want to capture that,” and also seeing the gaps where you can write or draw. You develop a sense of how much you can squeeze into each gap. If you find that you’re picking up more keywords than you have the time to capture, you can increase your thresholds for interestingness or reduce the complexity of your capture.

You can develop this sense of timing by practising with talks of specific lengths. For example, if you go to a lot of 1-hour talks, you’ll get a sense of how much people typically cover in an hour. Every so often, it’s good to practise with something that’s really information-dense: a well-written nonfiction book, an intermediate- or advanced-level talk. Like the way you can improve your speed-reading performance by occasionally reading at a rate faster than you can comprehend, it’s good to scramble in sketchnoting from time to time.

[00:01] Mike Rohde: Hey. this is Mike Rohde for the Sketchnote podcast. Today we have Sacha Chua, but before we get started I’d like to say that this episode of the podcast is sponsored by my son Landon, who is very cute and two months old. But now back to the program.

This is Sacha Chua, she lives in Toronto, Ontario, and she uses something interesting that I wanted to explore because this is something I have talked about before – using a digital setup to do sketch notes.

I do my sketch notes in analog form. I use a notebook and a pen and I’ve played around with the iPad but I found it still challenging. I haven’t found figured out the right stuff for me, like the way to do it right, because I’ve been focused on this book. But Sacha has an advanced system that she uses. She uses a tablet PC and I wanted to bring her on the podcast to talk a little bit about her setup and how she uses it and how it works for her. So welcome Sacha, thank you for coming.

[00:53] Sacha Chua: Of course. I’d be happy to help people learn more.

[00:56] Mike Rohde: Great, so why don’t you start by explaining what the basic tools are that you use to do your digital setup? And then we can get into the benefits of those and maybe some of the things that make it different from paper.

[01:10] Sacha Chua: So when a lot of people think about digital sketchnoting–actually when people think about sketchnoting, they think pen and paper. And when they think about digital sketch noting, they might think of a tablet, like an iPad or an Android tablet. But if you start working with a tablet PC for digital sketchnoting–and I’ll show you that in a bit–you can take advantage of a lot more power: applications that work together, you have the processing power, and there are all sorts of interesting tools and workflows that you can use.

[01:35] Mike Rohde: Cool, very good. Well, why don’t you tell us about the tools you use, specifically, and the tablet PC and the styluses and software that you like to use for your setup.

[01:45] Sacha Chua: Alright, I use Lenovo X 220 tablet PC. I’ll zoom a little bit down to show you this. So this converts into a tablet by simply swiveling the screen and then you can either have it automatically rotate the screen for you or you can rotate it into your preferred orientation. Then I use Autodesk SketchBook Pro to draw on the screen itself. So as you can see I have that straight on there and in a short while I’ll switch over to sharing my screen so you can see that screen directly. So I use a Lenovo X220 tablet PC–they are fantastic—and I use Autodesk SketchBook Pro as the main drawing program. Then for publishing I’ll use Dropbox, Twitter, and WordPress for getting the sketch notes out there.

[02:33] Mike Rohde: Pretty cool. Now the stylus I see in your hand, I assume that came with the Lenovo?

[02:37] Sacha Chua: Yes, in fact it slots into a space for it, right in the case. And they have put in an alarm, so if you are walking off without your stylus, you actually get this little icon showing up on your screen.

[02:54] Mike Rohde: Oh, the proximity alarm. That is very cool.

[02:57] Sacha Chua: Yeah, and you can actually use pen and touch to interact with your screen. Because I do so many sketches notes, I’ve set it up to only recognize the pen. As you can see, even if I touch it, I can use my palm, it doesn’t trigger. If I use the pen, then things happen.

[03:14] Mike Rohde: So now Sacha has gone ahead and switched over to screen view so we can actually see her how she works and she can explain a little more of her process. So go ahead, Sacha.

[03:21] Sacha Chua: Okay, so you’re asking about whether I zoom in. I really like Autodesk SketchBook Pro because it has such a pen-based interface. I can zoom in and scroll around fairly easily–not as easily as you can with a multi-touch display, but easily enough so I can go in here, write a few things more eligibly, and then I can zoom out and see how that fits into the whole space or move things around as needed.

[03:56] Mike Rohde: I think I have seen Dave Gray do this work and I assume if you felt you needed to center under those two columns you could easily grab it and move it over, if you like, so that is one of the advantages to that software.

[04:10] Sacha Chua: Absolutely, and that makes me totally spoiled when it comes to working digitally. You know that challenge when sometimes speakers have too much content or too little content and you are scrambling for space in your sketchnote… When you are working on a computer, it’s easy to lasso an item, move it around and make space. For example, if it turns out that people didn’t give as much content as you expected, you can move things around and it looks like an excellent use of white space.

[04:43] Mike Rohde: Wonderful. Now in the middle of that drawing I see you got your work flow. Can you zoom that up and maybe take us through your work flow?

[04:49] Sacha Chua: Sure. So I do a lot of sketchnotes of books and presentations, and as I mentioned, I do most of that in Autodesk SketchBook Pro. A couple of things make it much easier for me to get this out very quickly: I usually work with a drawing template. Let me show you what that looks like with it. I say Add image, I pick one of my templates (for example, "grid and credits") and what that does is it allows me to add a very faint grid that I can draw on. Sometimes I leave this grid in, sometimes I take it out, but it means I don’t have to worry about my lines wandering elsewhere. I do all this drawing in Autodesk SketchBook Pro with lots of layers, and then if I want to include any logos or pictures, I can draw that into Sketchbook directly. If I want to trace the logo, I can use Artrage Studio Pro which automatically picks up the colors as I am drawing on something. It’s much easier to color match without having to pick up those little colors in multicolor logos.

[05:46] Mike Rohde: So it looks like down there you also have Camtasia running as well.

[05:48] Sacha Chua: Yes I do. So I’ve sketched it out in Autodesk Sketch Book Pro. If I think I am going to want to put together a speed drawing video, I’ll use Camtasia Studio to record this in the background, like I am doing now. When I am done with the image, I’ll save it in Dropbox. This automatically synchronizes the file with my phone, and then I can use my phone or my computer to post that to Twitter. If I’m sketchnoting a conference with lots and lots of talks, I don’t want to be switching back and forth between Autodesk SketchBook Pro and Dropbox and Twitter and my blog and all those other things. I can use my phone to tweet the links immediately and then I can save the laptop for drawing.

[06:38] Mike Rohde: Gotcha. So you sort of offload some of those tasks to other devices and then keep the devices focused for the things they are really good at.

[06:47] Sacha Chua: Right. And that means I don’t have to be switching back and forth between applications, so if people are saying interesting things, I can keep drawing. I usually post recap blog posts. If it is just one talk, then I’ll blog it right away. If it’s a conference, I’ll wait until the end of the conference to post a blog post with thumbnails and links to the full size images, so people can share this with other people later on. In addition to posting it to my blog, I also upload my sketchnotes in Evernote, so then it is much easier to search through my notes.

[07:23] Mike Rohde: Great. So tell me a little bit about this: I’ve been exploring every now and then and I have been thinking of going back because of some of the new features. Do you tag your work? Can Evernote scan your sketch notes since you have really beautiful handwriting? Can it scan the sketch notes to pick up words or do you have to manually enter that meta-information?

[07:44] Sacha Chua: This is amazing. It can actually understand most of what I write and then I help it a little bit with some key words. So for example, you can see how I can put most of the sketch notes into this "Sketchnotes by Sacha Chua" notebook, which I have actually shared publicly so anyone can find this notebook and subscribe to it. If I search in here… Say, for example, I’m looking for “visual library” which you mentioned in your book. So "visual library"–you can see how it is looking inside the image and it it’s highlighting where it sees those words. Here are my sketch notes, you can see here how "visual library" [shows up] even inside all caps – a small box has been found and highlighted. In addition to being able to search text, I also occasionally fill in some more information so that I can easily find the visual metaphors that I use. For example, in this digital sketchnoting workflow, I’ve also added some words that I might not have written down or might not easily be recognized by Evernote. You can see here how I’ve got this keyword for magnifying glass, and that allows me to find all the sketch notes where I have drawn a magnifying glass in case I feel like challenging myself to use different visual metaphors.

[09:06] Mike Rohde: That is interesting. That is really fascinating.

[09:09] Sacha Chua: It is amazing. I strongly recommend checking Evernote. You can set it up so that it will import all the files into a folder. I set up a shortcut so after I publish the sketchnote using Dropbox, I can just right click on the file and have that be imported to my Evernote.

[09:25] Mike Rohde: Wow. I notice you have got a little spot in the lower left, some of the caveats of using this system. What are some of those at a high level?

[09:31] Sacha Chua: Well, let me switch to those so we can zoom in on that. A lot of times people get hung up on the expense. Certainly, if you already have a computer, buying a new tablet PC can be a significant cost. Because this is my main computer, I find that it is pretty much worth the investment. I’ve upgraded it with lots of memory and lots of hard disk space so I can use it for all the things that I do.

Apple tends not to believe in tablet computers that have pens in them. I really don’t know why, but if you want to work with a Lenovo X220 tablet PC like I do, then it probably means getting yourself set up on Microsoft Windows, because that is where most of the applications are. That can take a little bit of a learning curve for people.

The weight of this is a bit of a concern as well. I can’t remember the exact weight, but because I have the tablet as well as an extended battery pack, I can go for an entire conference without having to worry about plugging into a power outlet. But this also means I carry a fairly heavy backpack for these things.

And let’s mention battery life: if you don’t get an extended battery pack, your battery life will be much shorter than a regular tablet. But if you do get the extended battery, which I consider to be well worth it, then at least you don’t have to fight so much over a power outlet at conferences.

[10:58] Mike Rohde: Interesting. And I know I mentioned Dave Gray uses this tablet PC. I think a couple of years back we did a conference: I was up in front and he got to draw on his PC. I actually kind of liked the screen and it felt a lot like pencil and paper to me, oddly enough. I don’t know, but he might have had a different brand but it was the same thing. And I thought, "This is kind of interesting." I haven’t explored that yet because I have other machines I have already invested in and it wouldn’t be an investment for me, but I’m really curious about it. I think people are thinking about it and it is a really interesting option that you should consider.

[11: 31] Sacha Chua: It is actually very smooth and I prefer it over drawing on paper or a tablet. On paper, it is sometimes scratchy and your lines don’t go where you want them to go. The texture is nice, but I’ve found that when I’m drawing on a tablet PC, my lines look a lot more confident because they are digital and because I am not relying on friction and all those other things. A tablet is a much more consistent experience for me.

[12:01] Mike Rohde: This is really fascinating. I love that you have done that. I am really excited to be sharing this with people, because I think a lot of people still use paper. Thank you for being on the show. What we are going to do is include some links to all these references so people can check you out, they can read your blog, they can look at this image more closely and see your sketch notes and we will share that with people. Thank you so much for coming on, Sacha.

[12: 28] Sacha Chua: My pleasure. You know, digital drawing has been the key thing. It has made it much more fun for me and I think it would be lovely if more people gave it a try.

[12:36] Mike Rohde: Great. And maybe, as a way to end this show, can you verbally give us some places where people can find you: Twitter, blog and so forth?

[12:45] Sacha Chua: You can find me at Twitter as @sachac . You can check out my sketch notes and other things I have posted at my blog. You don’t have to remember my name for that one, you can go directly to livinganawesomelife.com. Which it is.

[13:06] Mike Rohde: I can see that you are passionate about it and I just loved talking with you today. Thank you for taking the time and hope you get lots of interest from people that are curious and asking questions. Thank you.

[13:15] Sacha Chua: My pleasure. Have fun.

[13:16] Mike Rohde: Okay. Thanks a lot.

[13:19] Mike Rohde: And that wraps up this episode of The Sketchnote Handbook Podcast. We are going to do more stuff like this and bring other people and see how their workflows work, so tune in for the next episodes as they come out. Thanks.

Mike Rohde’s The Sketchnote Handbook (see my sketchnotes of it) focuses on pen-and-paper sketchnoting. I really enjoy digital sketchnoting, although there’s a bit more of a barrier to entry in terms of hardware. I’ve figured out a pretty sweet workflow for live-publishing conference/event sketchnotes so that you can catch people while they’re looking at the Twitter hashtag. Mike and I will be talking about digital workflows and tips for one of his podcasts, and I wanted to sketch my thoughts/talking points in preparation.

Click on the image for a larger version of the sketchnote.

Not specifically mentioned there because it’s more of a blogging setup, but WordPress + NextGen Gallery + Windows Live Writer + Text Templates plugin = great.

sachac M-x customize-variable, or you can look for org-modules in my config at http://sachachua.com/dotemacs to see how I do it with (setq org-modules ...) and (org-load-modules-maybe... – Org-mode and habits